The miniature of the 13th century Byzantine manuscript., shows the divine service at Sophia of Constantinople. In front, in surplices and hats stand the singers, on the dais, - the emperor and the people. All hands are crossed on the chest, with hands hidden.

As you probably are aware, Met Cornelius has been criticized for his ecumenical activity and his openness to the MP. Perhaps you can give an update on the other thread about how you came to join Metropolitan Cornelius

I have heard about this and previously commented on it in the post quoted below. The short answer is that this is false gossip. The photograph below, for example, involved a government meeting - not religious participation as explained in this article:http://www.pravoslavie.ru/english/51565.htm

Thus, the photograph of Metropolitan Cornelius involves no participation in the religious services of heretics. It is the same thing as the heads of the Orthodox Christian, Muslim, Jewish, and Armenian millets attending a meeting chaired by an Ottoman governor. Old Orthodox Christians have generally always sympathized with the Muslim and Jewish communities who were likewise persecuted by the same Russian government. Occasionally, if a relatively benign Russian leader such as Putin does not persecute the Old Orthodox Church, then Nikonian heretics fabricate conspiracy theories such as this baseless gossip about Metropolitan Cornelius.

If you have evidence to the contrary (other than gossip), then please do share it.

For what it is worth, the photograph of Metropolitan Cornelius in the Kremlin is completely different from the participation of Metropolitan Tikhon (i.e. the Nikonian Patriarch of Russia) with Episcopal Bishop Grafton and other western heretics in their church services. Metropolitan Khrapovitsky even believed the heretical Anglicans have Episcopal apostolic succession.

Perhaps you can give an update on the other thread about how you came to join Metropolitan Cornelius

You don't have to look further than this thread in which you may find that вєликаго's comments played a significant part if you bother to read through it.

If you want to better understand the answer to your question, then I would suggest you temporarily put aside prejudices about Old Believers and read through this thread paying particular attention to certain of the questions I asked вєликаго along with his answers. A couple of those questions were asked with the objective of resolving misconceptions and therefore removing obstacles I had about accepting the Bela Krinitsa as the real Church and the Nikonians as heretics.

Since the Romanov era Nikonian Church accepted Franks into full communion without baptism, they were not as strict like the Matthewites have been. However, the Patriarchate of Constantinople was in full communion with the Russian Synod throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. They were two synods, but they were one and the same church, and they are the direct predecessors of both the Matthewites and the Old Calendarists (and obviously the new Calendarists as well). The Patriarchate of Constantinople also has a shameful history of intercommunion with the heretical Anglican hierarchy since the late 1600's, and they made heretical decress in the early 1700's which have never been rescinded. These discrepancies are only the tip of the iceberg. The Matthewites have done well to oppose the calendar change and other innovations, but the Matthewites are merely a conservative vestige of a decadent body which has been apostate for centuries.

However, if some decide to cut themselves off, not only from the local church which introduced the temptation, but from the entire One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church; and their reason is not one of dogmatic heresy; then they are the schismatics. In fact, they are not only schismatics but could be considered heretics as well for elevating certain externals in the life of the Church to the place of dogma.

That is precisely and exactly what the Russian Synod and the Patriarchate of Constantinople did. They famously made the anathemas of 1666, and both subsequently excommunicated people for making the sign of the cross with two fingers.

Yes, I am familiar with Met Kyrikos’ Synod and their meeting with Pat Alexander. However, do you not find it problematic for Old Believers to revere saints, and enter into dialogue with bishops, who cross themselves in a manner that they deem “anathema”.

Does the Synod of Pat Alexander revere any Nikonian Saints? I would be keenly interested to hear more about this.

I have also read that Pat Alexander has previously made vitriolic remarks against the Bela Krinitsa synod.

I was told by an Old Orthodox Christian Deacon in Russia that at the time Bishop Ambrose of Bosnia was received into the Church in the 1840's, all of the priested Old Believers without exception recognized him as their bishop. After some time, a certain priest in the late 1800's rejected Bishop Ambrose and again became priestless (although still believing in priesthood). It is the followers of this priest who formed the small lay community which the Novozybkov hierarchy represents. All of their bishops were arrested and imprisoned by the 1930's. They received a new bishop approved by the NKVD circa 1940 when they had only 18 parishes in all of Russia.

It is now my understanding that the Novozybkov hierarchy (i.e. Pat Alexander) is an instrument of the KGB just like the ROCOR and the Moscow Patriarchate. This would explain their acceptance of Nikonain saints and three fingered cross and their efforts towards dialogue with the Matthewites.

I read earlier today several references in the biography of Elder Barsanuphius of Optina by Victor Afanasiev saying that he loved the book 'In the Mountains of the Caucasus' and commonly recommended it to people. However, at the end of the book, one of his disciples relates that the controversy over this book caused him to slightly change his mind towards it, and he concluded that it was a good book with a minor error. He said if the the introduction were thrown out, then it would basically be acceptable.

This shows that even the greatest of the Optina Fathers had blindly followed the Russian synod even into heresy.

Name fighting is a denial of the power of God. It is the heresy of Barlaam and the Frankish scholastics which denies the energy of God is God.

The Name of God is an Energy of God. The Name of God is God Himself.This is true since the energy of God is God Himself as Saint Gregory Palamas and others have truly said.

How is the Name of God a divine energy?

To answer your question, the Divine Names are Divine. The Divine Names are God. The Divine Names are uncreated. Saint Dionysios the Areopagite wrote about this in his book on the Divine Names.http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/areopagite_03_divine_names.htmIf you accept the testimony of Holy Scripture, it also constantly testifies again and again to the inherent power and holiness in the Name of God.

The First Oecumenical Synod in 325 A.D. decreed that worship (i.e. the greek word "latreia") is reserved exclusively for the essence of God.We worship God's essence. We glorify His Name. That is not heretical. It is right and proper. To say that God's Name is God is to give glory to God's Name in obedience to His first commandment. To deny this is to blaspheme God's Name and violate the first commandment given by Moses.

Name fighting is another word for blasphemy which is the transgression of the very first of Moses's Ten Commandments. The Councils of the Russian Synod of 1913 and 1918 and the Council of Constantinople of that same period are blasphemous councils by ignorant heretics. Those councils were made by "men who have a form of godliness but deny the power." I spit upon and trample what they say in the Awesome Name of Jesus Christ my God. To put it crudely, those blasphemous councils and the heretical synods from whence they came are worthy of nothing better than to wipe a dog's arse.

Returning to Victor Afanasiev's biography of Elder Barsanuphius of Optina, it says in other places that the great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy had more than once come to the door to visit Elder Barsanuphius at Optina and decided to turn away before meeting him. The biography's author assumingly writes that this was because of Tolstoy's pride. What an ungrounded conclusion! How does he know that?

Leo Tolstoy was bitterly critical of corruption in the Russian government and the Russian synod and recognized that Optina had a degree of holiness that set them somewhat apart from the rest of the degenerate Russian synod. That is why people like he and Dostoevsky even bothered with Optina in the first place. If Elder Barsanuphius would have had the guts to speak out against the Russian synod instead of follow it, then Tolstoy might have gone the distance as well.

Of course, Tolstoy was wrong to give up on all organized religion and the institution of marriage, but the Biography of Elder Barsanuphius concentrates exclusively on those negative points and omits to mention Tolstoy's huge positive aspects.

After much discussion with the mod team, we decided that such inflammatory titles against certain figures of either Eastern Orthodox, Certain Old Calendarist/Traditionalist Orthodox, or Oriental Orthodox, each canonically defined in their own ways, even though divided from one another, cannot be called "heretics," "schismatics", or any equivalent of the phrases. Members of the councils of the Russian Synod and Constantinople as mentioned in your post, from what is understood, fits under this description, and so it would be inappropriate and against forum rules to call him a "schismatic", as the title carries a more condemnatory tone. It is more fitting to say, "they espouse a belief in so-and-so, which I believe is heretical" or something less inflammatory, but is just as effective in the discussion. I won't administer a warning in hopes that you understand the rules and behave in an appropriate manner in the future here with us at oc.net.

Although he failed to follow through and become one of them, in his 'Confessions', Leo Tolstoy credits the Old Believers for his religious beliefs including pacifism and his adoption of certain old Russian customs including his clothing.

Since Tolstoy himself credits the Old Believer influence upon his pacifism, and his best friend Mahatma Ghandi credits Leo Tolstoy as the principle influence upon his pacifist doctrines as well as his anti-colonial political philosophy, it is quite appropriate to credit the Old Orthodox Church for its direct and positive influence upon the pacifist and anti-colonial political movements of the twentieth century including the philosophy of Leo Tolstoy and his philosophical heirs including Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

A documentary about Agafia Lykov, a Bela Krinitsa Old Believer whose dad took the family into the Siberian wilderness in the 1930's to escape Stalin's persecution of Christians. The went undiscovered until 1978 and had no knowledge that World War II had taken place.

Although he failed to follow through and become one of them, in his 'Confessions', Leo Tolstoy credits the Old Believers for his religious beliefs including pacifism and his adoption of certain old Russian customs including his clothing.

Since Tolstoy himself credits the Old Believer influence upon his pacifism, and his best friend Mahatma Ghandi credits Leo Tolstoy as the principle influence upon his pacifist doctrines as well as his anti-colonial political philosophy, it is quite appropriate to credit the Old Orthodox Church for its direct and positive influence upon the pacifist and anti-colonial political movements of the twentieth century including the philosophy of Leo Tolstoy and his philosophical heirs including Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

I do not wish to start a large discussion on this point, but Tolstoy does not credit -solely- the Old Believers for this influence.He in fact credits his dealings and discussions with a number of groups. I will give you quote down below so that it cannot be misconstrued.

He spent quite a lot of time with sectarian groups who espouse peace and brotherhood and were of precisely the 'simple peasants with their beliefs' that he talks about in A Confession.

"At that time, in consequence of my interest in religion, I came into touch with believers of various faiths: Catholics, protestants, Old-Believers, Molokans, and others. And I met among them many men of lofty morals who were truly religious. I wished to be a brother to them. And what happened? That teaching which promised to unite all in one faith and love — that very teaching, in the person of its best representatives, told me that these men were all living a lie; that what gave them their power of life was a temptation of the devil; and that we alone possess the only possible truth. And I saw that all who do not profess an identical faith with themselves are considered by the Orthodox to be heretics, just as the Catholics and others consider the Orthodox to be heretics. And i saw that the Orthodox (though they try to hide this) regard with hostility all who do not express their faith by the same external symbols and words as themselves; and this is naturally so; first, because the assertion that you are in falsehood and I am in truth, is the most cruel thing one man can say to another; and secondly, because a man loving his children and brothers cannot help being hostile to those who wish to pervert his children and brothers to a false belief. And that hostility is increased in proportion to one's greater knowledge of theology. And to me who considered that truth lay in union by love, it became self-evident that theology was itself destroying what it ought to produce. "

Disclaimer: My ancestors and family are all Molokans, one of the sectarian groups that Tolstoy spent time with. I do not with to get into a 'heretics' discussion here...not my purpose in mentioning that Tolstoy's influences were not -only- the Old Believers. Just a clearing of the more complex picture his life was than just that.

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All opinions expressed by myself are quite tragically my own, and not those of any other poster or wall hangings.

If you have evidence to the contrary (other than gossip), then please do share it.

Well, it looks like several of my old links to this information are no longer active.

There was a site called http://slovocerkvi.ru/ that chronicled the ecumenical activities of Metropolitan Cornelius that led to a schism in his Synod. It seems that most of the pages are no longer accessible. However, a few pages can be accessed through the Way Back Machine.

For instance:

Quote

We - Christians are Russian Orthodox Old Believers' Church (FROC). At the Cathedral RTWPs 2007 there was discord: Metropolitan Cornelius (Titov) and his supporters refused to anathematize Nikonian heresy, approved the policy of rapprochement with the Moscow Patriarchate and the Russian Orthodox Church have made a number of illegal acts. In this they denounced the unity of the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church and the spiritual succession among the witnesses who are denounced innovations partiarha Nikon.

Thus Metropolitan Cornelius (Titov), ​​and all who were with him in the communion of the Church were fences and formed the "unauthorized gathering." In this case, however, for razdornikami were all outside legal attributes, including the very name of the church - RTWPs.

We, on the other hand, as they are required, broke communion with razdornikami and convened own Sacred Council (2007 Altufevo). For the purpose of identity we adopted the name "Old Orthodox Church of Christ Belokrinitskoy hierarchy" (DTSHBI). Subsequently, we have specified the name of the Church, having designated geographical region, and now refer to as "Russian Old Orthodox Church of Christ Belokrinitskoy hierarchy" (RDTSHBI).

I assume you don't know Russian, but if you do then consult the original sites rather than the butchered machine translations.

Here is another (butchered) quote, with reference to specific acts of Metropolitan Cornelius:

Quote

When taking into account the facts of ecumenical activities of the Administration of Metropolitan Cornelius till 18.10.2007 (Bayram Summit 2006, participation in the celebration of remembrance and gratification Aki rules and ways of the faith of the Pope in 2006, or, for example, joint with nikonianami religious act of "Procession" in Kostroma where under the banner of Old Believers Nikonianism blessed representative of the priesthood to carry the gospel to the inoslavnymii features of "ROC" MP, official interview, for example, in Kiev, etc.), which was justified at the Council RTWPs 2007.

Here is a good interview with Metropolitan Cornelius from 2009 where he expresses a very open attitude towards the Moscow Patriarchate and to dialogue with them, an attitude which is in stark contrast to the attitude towards the Moscow Patriarchate expressed by Old Calendarists and many Old Believers:

When asked about his relationship with Patriarch Kirill, Metropolitan Cornelius stated in this interview:

Quote

Our aim is for the first time in three and a half centuries begin equal, free from bias and public pressure for a thorough dialogue revealing our positions in a spirit of mutual respect. And in the course of this dialogue, I am firmly convinced that the Old Believers have something to say and what to ask the other side.

He also said:

Quote

. I believe that we need to engage in dialogue with the Moscow Patriarchate, but not in order to reach doctrinal compromises, and to contribute to the revival of spiritual and moral traditions of our people through the understanding of the causes and negative effects of the church split. We understand that to be a very difficult dialogue, which does not bode rapid progress, as between us have accumulated significant differences on many issues. Yet a constructive dialogue about the historical evaluation division and concrete steps for the return doraskolnomu to build the Church and society is needed.

What is striking in this interview, again, is his openness to dialogue with the Moscow Patriarchate and his respectful attitude towards the MP. There are no scathing denunciations in his words as would typically characterize Old Calendarist and other anti-MP groups.

That's all I have time to dig up for now. I know it isn't much, but you can do your own research from there.

Thanks for the material. It appears we have different concerns and different interests.

We probably would have different approaches to the material you cited, but as the New Testament instructs us to count our days and use the time wisely, there are matters that are more appropriate for me to investigate in depth. This is not the first time I have been prodded by a Nikonian to question Metropolitan Cornelius in connection with events of 2007. When looking into the matter the first time around, I came to the conclusion that I was being led on a wild goose chase at the whim of haphazard suggestions, instigations and opinions of the enemies of the Church. I am not accusing you of any such thing, but I am saying that I was not born yesterday and both experience and my conscience tell me that after a certain point my time is better invested elsewhere.

On another note, I am compelled to issue a compliment. Jah 777 seems to be somewhat the resident encyclopedia of the affairs of modern eastern churches.

After much discussion with the mod team, we decided that such inflammatory titles against certain figures of either Eastern Orthodox, Certain Old Calendarist/Traditionalist Orthodox, or Oriental Orthodox, each canonically defined in their own ways, even though divided from one another, cannot be called "heretics," "schismatics", or any equivalent of the phrases. Members of the councils of the Russian Synod and Constantinople as mentioned in your post, from what is understood, fits under this description, and so it would be inappropriate and against forum rules to call him a "schismatic", as the title carries a more condemnatory tone. It is more fitting to say, "they espouse a belief in so-and-so, which I believe is heretical" or something less inflammatory, but is just as effective in the discussion. I won't administer a warning in hopes that you understand the rules and behave in an appropriate manner in the future here with us at oc.net.

Thank you for your cooperation and God bless.

Mina

Mina,

I sincerely appreciate the message and thy kind manner of advisement. I also consider this important to be publicly known rather than hidden and therefore plan to post it publicly.

When I looked at the link you provided, my first thought was that you might warn me against the admittedly crude or vulgar language I used when referring to a "dog's arse." If that had been the case, then you would have my entire respect and cooperation. Unfortunately, that was not your stated concern. I wonder exactly who it was that thought it more proper to censor the word "heretic" than to censor vulgarity?

There is no truth in your analysis which has made according to the spirit of error. Heretics don't want to be called heretics because evil shuns light. I call things by their true names. I call a heretic a heretic. If your forum rules or mod team forbid a heretic to be called a heretic, then your forum rules or mod team are at fault. I am neither guided nor bound by such a spirit of error.

Your forum laws are unjust, and an unjust law is no law at all. I do not consent to your request to modify theological language. That is an insult to God. If you choose to take any actions against my account such as bans or warnings, then I count it as glory to God.

Be that as it may, thanks again for your kind manner of advisement. I obviously think your forum has problems, but for what it's worth, I have yet found your forum much more tolerant of the truth than the St Euphrosynos Café. I hope it remains that way.

God be with you my friend.

+Dionysii

---------------------------------------------------------

I find interesting what the Name fighters think of the passage I quoted about Elder Barsanuphius's submission to their doctrine at the end of his life (in Appendix III 'Letters of the Elder's Spiritual Children' in the letter of Novice Elena Shamonina on page 810 of his biography by Victor Afanasiev as published by St. Herman Press). I would like to post this letter in full. Will the Name fighters use this fact in their arguments against their opponents who claim Elder Barsanuphius as a partisan of the Name of God?

It turned out that at the end of his life, Elder Barsanuphius forsook the glory of the Name of God for the favor of the Russian synod. Like most Nikonians, he chose the wide easy way of cowardice rather than the persecution in which Fr. Antony Boulatovich thrived.

It's been second time you discuss moderator's actions in public. Therefore I give you post moderation for 30 days. During that time your messages will be published after the approval by a moderator.

If you think this action is unjust, send a PRIVATE message to me - Michał Kalina.

Warning reduced from a 30 day Post Moderation to a 30 day Warning. Dionysii, please keep in mind the Rules of the Forum. If you persist in breaking them you will be receive stricter warnings. - LizaSymonenko, Global Moderator

In addition to some of the rules broken, you also shared a private message publicly without permission. It is both inappropriate and against forum rules. I will not extend your warning, but make sure you will not do this again.

Mina

August 12, 2013

« Last Edit: August 12, 2013, 12:22:47 PM by minasoliman »

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Vain existence can never exist, for "unless the LORD builds the house, the builders labor in vain." (Psalm 127)

If the faith is unchanged and rock solid, then the gates of Hades never prevailed in the end.

Although he failed to follow through and become one of them, in his 'Confessions', Leo Tolstoy credits the Old Believers for his religious beliefs including pacifism and his adoption of certain old Russian customs including his clothing.

Since Tolstoy himself credits the Old Believer influence upon his pacifism, and his best friend Mahatma Ghandi credits Leo Tolstoy as the principle influence upon his pacifist doctrines as well as his anti-colonial political philosophy, it is quite appropriate to credit the Old Orthodox Church for its direct and positive influence upon the pacifist and anti-colonial political movements of the twentieth century including the philosophy of Leo Tolstoy and his philosophical heirs including Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

I think this is a pretty fair assessment.

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St. Meletius the Confessor – Submit not yourselves to monastics, nor to presbyters, who teach lawless things and evilly propound them. And why do I say only monastics or presbyters? Follow not even after bishops who guilefully exhort you to do and say and believe things that are not profitable. What

I understand Name fighting to be a denial of the power of God. It is the heresy of Barlaam and the Frankish scholastics which denies the energy of God is God.

The Name of God is an Energy of God. The Name of God is God Himself.This is true since the energy of God is God Himself as Saint Gregory Palamas and others have truly said.

How is the Name of God a divine energy? Is an icon also a divine energy? What about the Cross? The Bible? Are these things also God?

As I understand, unlike the Name of God, neither crosses nor icons are themselves energies of God.My prayer books instruct me to pray every morning to the power of the holy cross rather than the cross itself. I understand this power to be God Himself, an uncreated energy of God. Canonical Christian ikons and crosses can convey certain of the energies of God if they have the Name of God inscribed upon them. Saint Gregory Palamas has in fact stated that it is pointless to venerate a cross that is void of the Name of God. Likewise, Saint John of Damascus has stated that holy ikons receive power when the Name of God is inscribed upon them.

Old Believers have long considered that the Nikonian Church (including some of the old Nikonian anti-Soviet catacomb Christians and a few old calendarists) is officially heretical of the second rank which means schismatics. The difference between this second rank and full heretics of the first rank (i.e. Sergianists, oecumenists) is that schismatics retain apostolic succession. These rules are in the Canons of Saints Basil and Athanasius.

Following their Archbishop Antony Khrapovitsky, the Nikonians in 1913 and 1918 officially adopted a doctrine against the Name of God which would qualify them as full heretics of the first order if it were examined in light of the Church Fathers. Archpriest Avvakum Petrov, the leader of the Old Believer Church during the Nikonian schism, had this to say about the Names of God on the opening page of his autobiography. I have highlighted a particularly interesting passage.

‘And now , O Master, bless me so that sighing from my heart I might proclaim Dionysios the Areopagite on the Divine Names which are the eternally connatural and true Names for God, those which are proximate and those which are consequent, that is to say, laudatory. These are the connatural: He that is, Light, Truth, Life. Only four are of the essential, but of the consequent there re many. These are: Lord, the Almighty, the Unfathomable, the Unapproachable, the Thrice-radiant, the Tri-substantial, the King of Glory, the Omnipresent, Fire, Spirit, and God; understand others after this manner.

From this same Dionysios on Truth: For the falling away of Truth is repudiation of self, for Truth is connatural,; for if Truth is connatural, the falling away of Truth is repudiation of the connatural, and that which cannot be, is not.

And we say this: the novelty lovers have lost the substance of God by falling away from the true Lord, the holy and life-giving Spirit. According to Dionysios, as soon as they fall away from the Truth, they at once repudiate the connaturl. But God cannot fall away from His own substance, and that which cannot be is not in Him: omnipresent and everlasting is out true God. It would be better for them in the creed not to say “Lord,” a consequent name, than to cut out “the True,” for in it is contained the substance of God. But we, the true believers, confess both names; we believe “in the Holy Spirit, the true Lord and our life-giving Light,” who is worshipped together with the Father and the Son …’

‘And now , O Master, bless me so that sighing from my heart I might proclaim Dionysios the Areopagite on the Divine Names which are the eternally connatural and true Names for God, those which are proximate and those which are consequent, that is to say, laudatory. These are the connatural: He that is, Light, Truth, Life. Only four are of the essential, but of the consequent there re many. These are: Lord, the Almighty, the Unfathomable, the Unapproachable, the Thrice-radiant, the Tri-substantial, the King of Glory, the Omnipresent, Fire, Spirit, and God; understand others after this manner.

From this same Dionysios on Truth: For the falling away of Truth is repudiation of self, for Truth is connatural,; for if Truth is connatural, the falling away of Truth is repudiation of the connatural, and that which cannot be, is not.

And we say this: the novelty lovers have lost the substance of God by falling away from the true Lord, the holy and life-giving Spirit. According to Dionysios, as soon as they fall away from the Truth, they at once repudiate the connaturl. But God cannot fall away from His own substance, and that which cannot be is not in Him: omnipresent and everlasting is out true God. It would be better for them in the creed not to say “Lord,” a consequent name, than to cut out “the True,” for in it is contained the substance of God. But we, the true believers, confess both names; we believe “in the Holy Spirit, the true Lord and our life-giving Light,” who is worshipped together with the Father and the Son …’

The above edition is apparently the most complete English edition of Archpriest Avvakum's life. The passage quoted above is not included in the comparatively abbreviated edition of Saint Avvakum's life included in George Fedotov's 'Treasury of Russian Spirituality' which omits the first five pages as well as the book's opening declaration that Avvakum composed it out of obedience to his confessor Epifanij (which whom he was later cremated). This abbreviated life of Saint Avvakum exists online: http://www.holytrinitymission.org/books/english/russian_spirituality_fedotov.htm#_Toc46671186

‘And now , O Master, bless me so that sighing from my heart I might proclaim Dionysios the Areopagite on the Divine Names which are the eternally connatural and true Names for God, those which are proximate and those which are consequent, that is to say, laudatory. These are the connatural: He that is, Light, Truth, Life. Only four are of the essential, but of the consequent there re many. These are: Lord, the Almighty, the Unfathomable, the Unapproachable, the Thrice-radiant, the Tri-substantial, the King of Glory, the Omnipresent, Fire, Spirit, and God; understand others after this manner.

From this same Dionysios on Truth: For the falling away of Truth is repudiation of self, for Truth is connatural,; for if Truth is connatural, the falling away of Truth is repudiation of the connatural, and that which cannot be, is not.

And we say this: the novelty lovers have lost the substance of God by falling away from the true Lord, the holy and life-giving Spirit. According to Dionysios, as soon as they fall away from the Truth, they at once repudiate the connaturl. But God cannot fall away from His own substance, and that which cannot be is not in Him: omnipresent and everlasting is out true God. It would be better for them in the creed not to say “Lord,” a consequent name, than to cut out “the True,” for in it is contained the substance of God. But we, the true believers, confess both names; we believe “in the Holy Spirit, the true Lord and our life-giving Light,” who is worshipped together with the Father and the Son …’

The above edition is apparently the most complete English edition of Archpriest Avvakum's life. The passage quoted above is not included in the comparatively abbreviated edition of Saint Avvakum's life included in George Fedotov's 'Treasury of Russian Spirituality' which omits the first five pages as well as the book's opening declaration that Avvakum composed it out of obedience to his confessor Epifanij (which whom he was later cremated). This abbreviated life of Saint Avvakum exists online: http://www.holytrinitymission.org/books/english/russian_spirituality_fedotov.htm#_Toc46671186

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St. Meletius the Confessor – Submit not yourselves to monastics, nor to presbyters, who teach lawless things and evilly propound them. And why do I say only monastics or presbyters? Follow not even after bishops who guilefully exhort you to do and say and believe things that are not profitable. What

Unless you have the font set very small, are using some browser no one's heard of, or there are problems with your computer, I can't imagine how you can't find it, because it's in the same row as Home, Help and the rest of them.

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My only weakness is, well, never mind

He said he had a horrible houseI looked in it and learnt to shut my mouth

I wanted to thank everyone who has contributed to this thread, I think it has proven to be a very decent threat over all, although, there has been some considerable amount of "troll" like activity from some who apparently desire to use underhanded methods of slander etc, against Old Believers.

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St. Meletius the Confessor – Submit not yourselves to monastics, nor to presbyters, who teach lawless things and evilly propound them. And why do I say only monastics or presbyters? Follow not even after bishops who guilefully exhort you to do and say and believe things that are not profitable. What